I’ll be honest. There are people who’ll tell you being on the telly isn’t all it’s cracked up to be – but they’re lying. It’s a pretty good gig, all things considered. Every day we film MasterChef I get up in the morning and go into a studio where teams of very talented people work absurdly hard to, quite literally, make me look good while I scoff food for a living. That’s a pretty lucky place to find yourself at my stage of life – particularly when you’ve lived the life I have. 

     It’s a much easier job, for example, than working twenty hours straight in a kitchen, long past the point of physical and mental exhaustion, all while some salty-­­mouthed sous chef screams insults about your cooking/work ethic/knife technique/genetic heritage. You’re far less likely to go home with a serious knife wound or a burn. It’s infinitely more rewarding than being, for example, a junkie. Or bankrupt. Or homeless. Or dangerously irresponsible. Or opening a restaurant that nobody comes to. Or being publicly shamed in the media for all of the above. 

     It’s far better than being a pathological perfectionist and workaholic, to the point where all your relationships combust and you find yourself stranded and alone on the wrong side of the world, far from friends and family. Trust me, being on the telly is not that bad. 

     Every day I get to work with people who are just as passionate and excited about good food as I am, a privilege I’ve been looking for my whole life. To work with aspiring cooks who’ve put everything on the line for a shot at a career in food is something I can relate to painfully well. I can’t imagine a better job than working on MasterChef. The money is great, and for the first time in my career I get to come home at a reasonable hour and spend time with my kids, which, as Mastercard would say, is priceless. 

     On reflection, there is one better job than working on MasterChef, and that’s working on Junior MasterChef. That’s my favourite part of the job, because when I’m away from my kids, all I think about is my kids. I know how to talk to kids, because I’m very much a kid myself. At heart, I’d say I’m a juvenile delinquent. Over the years I’ve learned how to adult and wear a nice suit and all that, but underneath the facade I’m just a wee lad with a ridiculous sense of immaturity. 

     I can see on a child’s face when they’re worried, scared, anxious, whatever it is, and I understand, because I go through the same thing on set. On the adult set, before we start rolling, it’ll take me time to warm up and tamp down my anxiety. I’ll come in early, make everyone coffee and try to ease myself into not worrying about the hundred people standing behind the studio lights waiting for me to fuck up. That whole scenario is very intense. But when the kids are on, things aren’t as serious as in the adult world – they don’t have to worry about mortgages or marriages, or looking silly in front of their colleagues when the show goes to air. They can be entirely in the moment, and any chef will tell you that’s when we cook at our best. 

     There’s very little difference between the expression on the face of a globally famous Michelin star chef plating up their signature dish, and a ten year old really nailing a panna cotta they’re about to serve to their mum. For me, that’s what it’s all about. When the kids are competing, they aren’t thinking about their careers or what happens afterwards. They have nothing but excitement and focus. Every day with those kids is just a joy. There’s an infectious excitement that takes me right back to the start of my career and the feeling of wonderful discovery that real cooking is all about. 

     If you watch that show, the pure exuberance of those kids when they take on a recipe and create a little piece of art on the plate is precisely what drew me to cooking in the first place. I’ve been pursuing that feeling in one way or another my whole life, for better or worse. At times, it almost destroyed me. But in the end, it saved me. Along the way, there was shame, fear, anxiety and despair, but also hope, joy and a lot of properly delicious food – and that’s not a bad life to live.